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Climate change didn’t cause the culture wars, but culture wars are making climate change harder to solve.
In new research from Kings College London (KCL), divisions over climate change are seen as worse than divisions over Brexit, with the public more likely to say there is tension between climate change sceptics and believers (64%) than between Leavers and Remainers (52%), or between younger and older generations (45%).
This is despite the broad-based consensus on the importance of the issue that Climate Barometer data evidences, and which is seen consistently in wider research (e.g. the recent Britain Talks Climate & Nature report, which highlights widespread care for nature, wildlife and the benefits that the transition to clean, renewable energy can bring).
More new research (from Hope Not Hate) diving into the differences between people who intend to vote Reform highlights climate change as one of the dividing lines among a disjointed coalition of factions. ‘Squeezed Stewards’ (in an echo of More in Common’s ‘Rooted Patriots’ segment, who have high levels of threat perception around environmental risks) care about nature and acknowledge the climate crisis. But the ‘Hardline Conservatives’ subgroup of Reform backers are much more likely to be in the minority of people who reject action on climate change entirely.
Following months of sweltering heatwaves, record-breaking wildfires and five regions in drought, this week it was provisionally confirmed that 2025 was the UK’s hottest summer on record.
While this new record was made ‘70 times’ more likely by climate change, the overwhelming sentiment is that the country is not prepared for more summers like this. The UK’s official climate advisors, practitioners who work on the frontline of the heatwave response, and the British public all agree that the UK isn’t ready for more extreme weather,worsening heat, and compounding risks like water scarcity and wildfires.
At the same time, there are important perception gaps to address. Despite the alarming statistics about heat-related deaths in the UK, many people were looking forward to the first heatwaves this summer. Lots think that heatwaves will only become a problem for the UK in the future. And many believe that hot weather poses more of a risk to other people, not themselves.
In this context there are important conversations now happening about how to grapple with the growing climate risks in the UK, including the sudden lurch towards air conditioning (despite its potential to make heat risks worse).
For more on the key issues surrounding heat communication, check out our recent opinion piece in Climate Home News.
A research paper – based on a nationally representative survey of 1750 UK residents in summer 2023 – finds several gaps and contradictions in heat perceptions. This includes:
The Conservative Party suffered their ‘worst ever’ result at the 2024 General Election. As well as general dissatisfaction with the Conservative government, polls consistently showed that worries about the cost of living, the condition of the NHS (and for some, immigration) were the biggest influences on how people voted.
Climate change – and more broadly environmental problems like air pollution and sewage in rivers – were also cited by voters when asked to select their top three most important issues going into the election. But was climate change a ‘vote winner’ at the election?
Echoing previous research showing an appetite for greater leadership on climate change, a large (20,000 people) survey by Focal Data on behalf of Persuasion and ECIU found that 53% of voters who had switched their vote from Conservatives to Labour (or the Liberal Democrats) believed that Government policy on climate change should be going further and faster that it has been (27% thought it should be going more slowly).
And polling by More in Common on behalf of E3G went even further, showing that Rishi Sunak’s decision (in September 2023) to slow down some of the country’s net zero policy timelines had a negative impact on voters. People were twice as likely to say that delaying net zero targets was one of Sunak’s biggest mistakes, than his biggest achievements.
Whilst the General Election was not fought on climate and net zero grounds (compared with the last General Election in 2019, there were roughly 50% fewer mentions of ‘climate’ in the British media election coverage), these findings suggest that there is currently no political capital to be found in opposing green policies.
The only party standing on an anti-net zero ticket were Reform UK – but the same More in Common polling found that immigration was overwhelmingly the reason that people voted for this party. Only 4% selected Reform’s environmental policies as a reason for voting for them.
Polling by Opinium for the Conservative Environment Network (CEN), conducted just before the 2024 General Election was announced, suggests that playing into Reform UK’s anti-net zero stance will not be a vote winner for the Conservative party.
One important finding is that although Reform UK is (uniquely among the other mainstream parties) campaigning on an anti-net zero ticket, climate change is not currently a salient issue for Reform voters. The CEN polling found that only 2% of Reform voters listed climate change/net zero/environment as their primary concern (the majority chose immigration as their primary concern).
This mirrors polling carried out across multiple European countries, ahead of the EU election which saw significant gains for far-right parties. In Europe, as in the UK, the rise in support for right wing parties does not appear to be driven by these parties’ policies on climate change (even if they tend to hold anti-net zero positions).
Commentary & Analysis
4th June 2024
Trust is the currency in which all communicators trade – and currently, its in short supply. Against this backdrop, do climate campaigns stand a chance?
A number of recent polls have suggested that younger generations – including teenagers – are showing some signs of climate fatigue.
New data collected across 33 countries by Ipsos and published on Earth Day found evidence of what they describe as rising apathy and fatalism among the young (especially men):
Millennial and Generation Z men feel more apathetic and fatalistic about climate change compared with older generations and with women. Three in ten say it’s already “too late” to tackle climate change. Similar proportions of young males agree there’s no point changing their own behaviour to tackle climate
change because it won’t make any difference anyway (Gen Z men, 32%; Millennial men 31%) .
Ipsos report considerable variation across different countries – a full 67% of Indian respondents felt it was already too late to do anything about climate change, whereas most in most other countries the level of agreement with this sentiment was between 20-30%.
But the age-based differences are clear across the large, international sample as a whole, and in the UK
And they underscore the importance of communication and engagement strategies that (whilst not shying away from the stark realities of climate change) do not stoke a sense of fatalism and erode any sense of agency among the public.
While Climate Barometer tracker data shows that overall public awareness about heat pumps is low, it seems that misinformation runs through what the public do claim to know about heat pumps.
An article from Carbon Brief summarises the top myths about heat pumps circulating among the British public and media discourse, including that 24% think running a heat pump costs more than a gas boiler, and 20% think heat pumps only work in new homes (Good Energy poll).
Commentary & Analysis
14th March 2024
People often don’t appreciate the scale of public support for climate action.
A climate of silence in the UK?
New analysis from Climate Barometer reveals more than half of Britons say they ‘rarely’ or ‘never’ share their opinions on climate change in everyday conversations.